Columbia’s President Tells Congress That Action Is Needed Against Antisemitism
The president of Columbia said the university had suspended 15 students. She promised that one visiting professor “will never work at Columbia again.”
And when she was grilled over whether she would remove another professor from his leadership position, she appeared to make a decision right there on Capitol Hill: “I think I would, yes.”
The president, Nemat Shafik, disclosed the disciplinary details, which are usually confidential, as part of an all-out effort on Wednesday to persuade a House committee investigating Columbia that she was taking serious action to combat a wave of antisemitism following the Israel-Hamas war.
In nearly four hours of testimony before the Republican-led Committee on Education and the Workforce, Dr. Shafik conceded that Columbia had initially been overwhelmed by an outbreak of campus protests. But she said its leaders now agreed that some had used antisemitic language and that certain contested phrases — like “from the river to the sea” — might warrant discipline.
“I promise you, from the messages I’m hearing from students, they are getting the message that violations of our policies will have consequences,” Dr. Shafik said.
Testifying alongside her, Claire Shipman, the co-chair of Columbia’s board of trustees, made the point bluntly. “We have a moral crisis on our campus,” she said.